Despite all the political machinations and hate towards the media coming from the president of the United States, I always thought the majority of Australian politicians supported the role of the press in safeguarding democracy.

And I certainly did not expect Peter Dutton — amid an election campaign, one with citizens heading to the polls on World Press Freedom Day — to come out swinging at the ABC and Guardian Australia, telling his followers to ignore “the hate media”.

I’m not saying Labor is likely to be the great saviour of the free press either.

The ALP has been slow to act on a range of important press freedom issues, including continuing to charge journalism students upwards of $50,000 for the privilege of learning at university how to be a decent watchdog for society.

Labor has increased, slightly, funding for the ABC, and has tried to continue with the Coalition’s plans to force the big tech platforms to pay for news. But that is not enough.

The World Press Freedom Index has been telling us for some time that Australia’s press is in a perilous state. Last year, Australia dropped to 39th out of 190 countries because of what Reporters Without Borders said was a “hyperconcentration of the media combined with growing pressure from the authorities”.

We should know on election day if we’ve fallen even further.

What is happening in America is having a profound impact on journalism (and by extension journalism education) in Australia.

‘Friendly’ influencers
We’ve seen both parties subtly start to sideline the mainstream media by going to “friendly” influencers and podcasters, and avoid the harder questions that come from journalists whose job it is to read and understand the policies being presented.

What Australia really needs — on top of stable and guaranteed funding for independent and reliable public interest journalism, including the ABC and SBS — is a Media Freedom Act.

My colleague Professor Peter Greste has spent years working on the details of such an act, one that would give media in Australia the protection lacking from not having a Bill of Rights safeguarding media and free speech. So far, neither side of government has signed up to publicly support it.

Australia also needs an accompanying Journalism Australia organisation, where ethical and trained journalists committed to the job of watchdog journalism can distinguish themselves from individuals on YouTube and TikTok who may be pushing their own agendas and who aren’t held to the same journalistic code of ethics and standards.

I’m not going to argue that all parts of the Australian news media are working impartially in the best interests of ordinary people. But the good journalists who are need help.

The continuing underfunding of our national broadcasters needs to be resolved. University fees for journalism degrees need to be cut, in recognition of the value of the profession to the fabric of Australian society. We need regulations to force news organisations to disclose when they are using AI to do the job of journalists and broadcasters without human oversight.

And we need more funding for critical news literacy education, not just for school kids but also for adults.

Critical need for public interest journalism
There has never been a more critical need to support public interest journalism. We have all watched in horror as Donald Trump has denied wire services access for minor issues, such as failing to comply with an ungazetted decision to rename the Gulf of Mexico to the Gulf of America.

And mere days ago, 60 Minutes chief Bill Owens resigned citing encroachments on his journalistic independence due to pressure from the president.

The Committee to Protect Journalists is so concerned about what’s occurring in America that it has issued a travel advisory for journalists travelling to the US, citing risks under Trump administration policies.

Those of us who cover politically sensitive issues that the US administration may view as critical or hostile may be stopped and questioned by border agents. That can extend to cardigan-wearing academics attending conferences.

While we don’t have the latest Australian figures from the annual Reuters survey, a new Pew Research Centre study shows a growing gap between how much Americans say they value press freedom and how free they think the press actually is. Two-thirds of Americans believe press freedom is critical. But only a third believe the media is truly free to do its job.

If the press isn’t free in the US (where it is guaranteed in their constitution), how are we in Australia expected to be able to keep the powerful honest?

Every single day, journalists put their lives on the line for journalism. It’s not always as dramatic as those who are covering the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, but those in the media in Australia still front up and do the job across a range of news organisations in some fairly poor conditions.

If you care about democracy at all this election, then please consider wisely who you vote for, and perhaps ask their views on supporting press freedom — which is your right to know.

Alexandra Wake is an associate professor in journalism at RMIT University. She came to the academy after a long career as a journalist and broadcaster. She has worked in Australia, Ireland, the Middle East and across the Asia Pacific. Her research, teaching and practice sits at the nexus of journalism practice, journalism education, equality, diversity and mental health.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

In the middle of the Pacific, Fiji journalists are transforming their practice, as newsrooms around Suva are requiring journalists to become multimedia creators, shaping stories for the digital age.

A wave of multimedia journalists is surfacing in Fijian journalism culture, fostered during university education, and transitioning seamlessly into the professional field for junior journalists.

University of the South Pacific’s technical editor and digital communication officer Eliki Drugunalevu believes that multimedia journalism is on the rise for two reasons.

“The first is the fact that your phone is pretty much your newsroom on the go.”

With the right guidance and training in using mobile phone apps, “you can pretty much film your story from anywhere”, he says.

The second reason is that reliance on social media platforms gives “rise to mobile journalism and becoming a multimedia journalist”.

Drugunalevu says changes to university journalism curriculum are not “evolving fast enough” with the industry.

Need for ‘parallel learning’
“There needs to be parallel learning between what the industry is going through and what the students are being taught.”

Mobile journalism is growing increasingly around the world. In Fiji this is particularly evident, with large newsrooms entertaining the concept of a single reporter taking on multiple roles.

Fijian Media Association’s vice-president and Fiji Times editor-in-chief Fred Wesley says one example of the changing landscape is that the Times is now providing all its journalists with mobile phones.

“While there is still a photography department, things are slowly moving towards multimedia journalists.”

Wesley says when no photographers are available to cover a story with a reporter, the journalists create their own images with their mobile phones.

The Fiji Broadcasting Corporation (FBC) also encourages journalists to take part in all types of media including, online, radio, and television, even advertising for multimedia journalists. This highlights the global shift of replacing two-person teams in newsrooms.

Nevertheless, the transition to multimedia journalists is not as positive as commonly thought. Complaints against multimedia journalism come from journalists who receive additional tasks, leading to an increase in workload.

Preference for print
Former print journalist turned multimedia journalist at FBC, Litia Cava says she prefers focusing on just print.

She worked a lot less when she was just working in a newspaper, she says.

“When I worked for the paper, I would start at one,” she says. “But here I start working when I walk in.”

Executives at major Fijian news companies, such as Fiji TV’s director of news, current affairs and sports, Felix Chaudhary, also complain about the lack of equipment in their newsrooms to support this wave of multimedia journalism.

“The biggest challenge is the lack of equipment and training,” Chaudhary says.

Fiji TV is doing everything it can to catch up to world standards and provide journalists with the best equipment and training to prepare them for the transition from traditional to multimedia journalism.

“We receive a lot of assistance from PACMAS and Internews,” Chaudhary says. “However, we are constantly looking for more training opportunities. The world is already moving towards that, and we just have to follow suit or get left behind.”

More confidence
Fortunately for young Fijian journalists, Islands Business managing editor Samantha Magick says a lot of younger journalists are more confident to go out and produce and write their own stories.

“It’s the education now,” she says. “All the journalists coming through are multimedia, so not as challenging for them.”

University of South Pacific student journalist Brittany Louise says the practical learning of all the different media in her journalism course will be beneficial for her future.

“I think that’s a major plus,” she says. “You already have some sort of skills so it helps you with whatever different equipment it may be.”

Catrin Gardiner was a student journalist from the Queensland University of Technology who travelled to Fiji with the support of the Australian government’s New Colombo Plan Mobility Programme. This article is published in a partnership of QUT with Asia Pacific Report, Asia Pacific Media Network (APMN) and The University of the South Pacific.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Pacific Journalism Review (PJR) began life three decades ago in Papua New Guinea and recently celebrated a remarkable milestone in Fiji with its 30th anniversary edition and its 47th issue.

Remarkable because it is the longest surviving Antipodean media, journalism and development journal published in the Global South. It is also remarkable because at its birthday event held in early July at the Pacific International Media Conference, no fewer than two cabinet ministers were present — from Fiji and Papua New Guinea — in spite of the journal’s long track record of truth-to-power criticism.

Fiji’s Deputy Prime Minister Biman Prasad, a former economics professor at The University of the South Pacific (USP) and a champion of free media, singled out the journal for praise at the event, which was also the occasion of the launch of a landmark new book. As co-editor of Waves of Change: Media, Peace, and Development in the Pacific with Shailendra Singh and Amit Sarwal, Prasad says the book aimed to analyse recent developments in the Pacific because if sustainable peace and stability remain elusive in the region then long-term development is impeded.

Papua New Guinea’s Information and Communication Technologies Minister Timothy Masiu, who has faced criticism over a controversial draft media policy (now in its fifth version), joined the discussion, expressing concerns about geopolitical agendas impacting on the media and arguing in favour of “a way forward for a truly independent and authentic Pacific media”.

Since its establishment in 1994, the PJR has been far more than a research journal. As an independent publication, it has given strong support to Asia-Pacific investigative journalism, socio-political journalism, political-economy perspectives on the media, photojournalism and political cartooning in its three decades of publication. Its ethos declared:

While one objective of Pacific Journalism Review is research into Pacific journalism theory and practice, the journal has also expanding its interest into new areas of research and inquiry that reflect the broader impact of contemporary media practice and education.

A particular focus is on the cultural politics of the media, including the following issues: new media and social movements, indigenous cultures in the age of globalisation, the politics of tourism and development, the role of the media and the formation of national identity and the cultural influence of Aotearoa New Zealand as a branch of the global economy within the Pacific region.

It also has a special interest in climate change, environmental and development studies in the media and communication and vernacular media in the region.

PJR has also been an advocate of journalism practice-as-research methodologies and strategies, as demonstrated especially in its Frontline section, initiated by one of the mentoring co-editors, former University of Technology Sydney professor and investigative journalist Wendy Bacon, and also developed by retired Monash University Professor Chris Nash. Five of the current editorial board members were at the 30th birthday event: Griffith University’s Professor Mark Pearson; USP’s Associate Professor Shailendra Singh, the conference convenor; Auckland University of Technology’s Khairiah Abdul Rahman; designer Del Abcede; and current editor Dr Philip Cass.

As the founding editor of PJR, I must acknowledge the Australian Journalism Review which is almost double the age of PJR, because this is where I first got the inspiration for establishing the journal. While I was head of journalism at the University of Papua New Guinea in 1993, I was really frustrated at the lack of quality Pacific-specific media and journalism literature and research to draw on as resources for both critical studies and practice-led education.

So I looked longingly at AJR, and also contributed to it. I turned to the London-based Index on Censorship as another publication to emulate. And I thought, why not? We can do that in the Pacific and so I persuaded the University of Papua New Guinea Press to come on board and published the first edition at the derelict campus printer in Waigani in 1994.

We published there until 1998 when PJR moved to USP for five years. Then it was published for 18 years at Auckland University of Technology (AUT), mostly through the Pacific Media Centre, which closed in 2020. Since then it has been published by the nonprofit NGO Asia Pacific Media Network.

When celebrating the 20th anniversary of the journal at AUT in 2014, then AJR editor professor Ian Richards noted the journal’s “dogged perseverance” and contribution to Oceania research declaring:

Today, PJR plays a vital role publishing research from and about this part of the world. This is important for a number of reasons, not least because most academics ground their work in situations with which they are most familiar, and this frequently produces articles which are extremely local. If “local” means London or Paris or New York, then it’s much easier to present your work as “international” than if you live in Port Vila of Pago Pago, Auckland or Adelaide.

Also in 2014, analyst Dr Lee Duffield highlighted the critical role of PJR during the years of military rule and “blatant military censorship” in Fiji, which has eased since the repeal of its draconian Media Industry Development Act in 2023. He remarked:

The same is true of PJR’s agenda-setting in regard to crises elsewhere: jailing of journalists in Tonga, threatened or actual media controls in Tahiti or PNG, bashing of an editor in Vanuatu by a senior government politician, threats also against the media in Solomon Islands, and reporting restrictions in Samoa.

At the 30th anniversary launch, USP’s Adjunct Professor in development studies and governance Dr Vijay Naidu complimented the journal on the wide range of topics covered by its more than 1,100 research articles. He said the journal had established itself as a critical conscience with respect to Asia-Pacific socio-political and development dilemmas, and looked forward to the journal meeting future challenges.

I outlined many of those future challenges in a recent interview with Global Voices correspondent Mong Palatino. Issues that have become more pressing for the journal include responding to the changing geopolitical realities in the Pacific and collaborating even more creatively and closely on development, the climate crisis, and unresolved decolonisation issues with the region’s journalists, educators and advocates. To address these challenges, the PJR team have been working on an innovative new publishing strategy over the past few months.

View the latest Pacific Journalism Review: Gaza, genocide and media – PJR 30 years on, special double edition. The journal is indexed by global research databases such as Informit and Ebsco, but it is also available via open access for a Pacific audience here.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The three-day conference brought together people from the media industry, academics, civil society, and other interested parties.

A budding Fiji journalist Shivaali Shrutika said that newsrooms needed to evolve with the times.

“Transformation is important, wherever you are, and this is my observation,” she said.

“But in any space we work, particularly in mainstream media, we are reaching out to the communities that we want to become the voice for, but first we need to work on ourselves to be better people to understand them and then portray their minds and their thoughts to our audiences.”

She said every journalist and person involved in the newsroom should have a positive environment to work in.

“Because in journalism there is pressure, and there are deadlines in that space, it is important to have positive energy and a flexible environment to work in where everyone’s work is appreciated, especially for those trying as it is important to help boost people’s confidence and create those spaces.”

Lack of support
She said some young journalists left the profession due to a lack of support from more experienced reporters.

“Young journalists need this as they are new to the industry and unsure of their job, and when they are ignored, it can lower their confidence.”

Kaneta Namimatau is a final-year journalism student at the University of the South Pacific’s journalism programme.

“This is the biggest media conference I have been to and the first one in Fiji in 20 years,” he said.

He said the stories of intimidation and harassment that journalists in Fiji had faced, under the Media Industry Development Act, were very challenging to hear.

For him, the most powerful discussion at the conference was a panel on the “prevalence and impact of sexual harassment on female journalists”.

The sexual harassment of women journalists in Fiji is a major problem, according to a study published earlier this year.

‘Disheartening’ experience
“I found that disheartening to hear as it is something that I would hate for my sisters to have to experience in the workplace.”

Namimatau said the conference reinforced his decision to become a journalist and work in the Fiji news arena.

“I think I can contribute more to Fiji and tell the stories of the Banaba people, my people. I also want to represent my people from Rabi.”

The conference included academics, like USP’s associate professor Shailendra Singh, who was chair of the Pacific International Media Conference.

Dr Singh said it was a critical time for journalists in the region.

“Mainly, for two reasons, the digital disruption that we know has siphoned off huge amounts of advertising revenue from the media industry and mainstream media, as well as covid-19 which worsened the situation.

“I think most media organisations are struggling to survive.”

Dr Singh is coordinator of the journalism course at the University of the South Pacific.

He said the papers tabled and some of the discussions that took place would be published in Pacific Journalism Review.

The 2023 lifting of the FijiFirst government’s 2010 draconian media act, which involved constant censorship, has created a new environment in which Fiji journalists no longer operate in fear.

No ‘shying away’
Asia Pacific Report publisher and editor Dr David Robie said this was the sort of conference that Fiji needed right now” — a forum that did not “shy away” from the challenges facing reporters in the region.

Dr Robie described the panels, in particular the discussion around sexual harassment in Pacific journalism, as the best he had ever attended.

Other panels dealt with similarly difficult topics such as climate change, and stress/burn-out within the industry.

This is the first conference of its kind in Fiji in 20 years, and Dr Singh hopes that the delegates can take back what they have learned, to their newsrooms.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

His career in journalism has spanned five decades. He was the founding editor of the Pacific Journalism Review journal in 1994 and in 1996 he established the Pacific Media Watch, a media rights watchdog group.

He was head of the journalism department at the University of Papua New Guinea from 1993–1997 and at the University of the South Pacific from 1998–2002. While teaching at Auckland University of Technology, he founded the Pacific Media Centre in 2007.

He has authored 10 books on Asia-Pacific media and politics. He received the 1985 Media Peace Prize for his coverage of the Rainbow Warrior bombing — which he sailed on and wrote the book Eyes of Fire: The Last Voyage of the Rainbow Warrior — and the French and American nuclear testing.

In 2015, he was given the Asian Media Information and Communication Centre (AMIC) Asian Communication Award in Dubai. Global Voices interviewed him about the challenges faced by journalists in the Pacific and his career. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.

MONG PALATINO (MP): What are the main challenges faced by the media in the region?

DAVID ROBIE (DR): Corruption, viability, and credibility — the corruption among politicians and influence on journalists, the viability of weak business models and small media enterprises, and weakening credibility. After many years of developing a reasonably independent Pacific media in many countries in the region with courageous and independent journalists in leadership roles, many media groups are becoming susceptible to growing geopolitical rivalry between powerful players in the region, particularly China, which is steadily increasing its influence on the region’s media — especially in Solomon Islands — not just in development aid.

However, the United States, Australia and France are also stepping up their Pacific media and journalism training influences in the region as part of “Indo-Pacific” strategies that are really all about countering Chinese influence.

Indonesia is also becoming an influence in the media in the region, for other reasons. Jakarta is in the middle of a massive “hearts and minds” strategy in the Pacific, mainly through the media and diplomacy, in an attempt to blunt the widespread “people’s” sentiment in support of West Papuan aspirations for self-determination and eventual independence.

MP: What should be prioritised in improving journalism education in the region?

DR: The university-based journalism schools, such as at the University of the South Pacific in Fiji, are best placed to improve foundation journalism skills and education, and also to encourage life-long learning for journalists. More funding would be more beneficial channelled through the universities for more advanced courses, and not just through short-course industry training. I can say that because I have been through the mill both ways — 50 years as a journalist starting off in the “school of hard knocks” in many countries, including almost 30 years running journalism courses and pioneering several award-winning student journalist publications. However, it is important to retain media independence and not allow funding NGOs to dictate policies.

MP: How can Pacific journalists best fulfill their role in highlighting Pacific stories, especially the impact of the climate crisis?

DR: The best strategy is collaboration with international partners that have resources and expertise in climate crisis, such as the Earth Journalism Network to give a global stage for their issues and concerns. When I was still running the Pacific Media Centre, we had a high profile Pacific climate journalism Bearing Witness project where students made many successful multimedia reports and award-winning commentaries. An example is this one on YouTube: Banabans of Rabi: A Story of Survival

MP: What should the international community focus on when reporting about the Pacific?

DR: It is important for media to monitor the Indo-Pacific rivalries, but to also keep them in perspective — so-called ”security” is nowhere as important to Pacific countries as it is to its Western neighbours and China. It is important for the international community to keep an eye on the ball about what is important to the Pacific, which is ‘development’ and ‘climate crisis’ and why China has an edge in some countries at the moment.

Australia and, to a lesser extent, New Zealand have dropped the ball in recent years, and are tying to regain lost ground, but concentrating too much on “security”. Listen to the Pacific voices.

There should be more international reporting about the “hidden stories” of the Pacific such as the unresolved decolonisation issues — Kanaky New Caledonia, “French” Polynesia (Mā’ohi Nui), both from France; and West Papua from Indonesia. West Papua, in particular, is virtually ignored by Western media in spite of the ongoing serious human rights violations. This is unconscionable.

Mong Palatino is regional editor of Global Voices for Southeast Asia. An activist and former two-term member of the Philippine House of Representatives, he has been blogging since 2004 at mongster’s nest. @mongster Republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

He says he is astonished and quite delighted, and feels quite humbled by it all.

“However, I feel that it’s not just me, I owe an enormous amount to my wife, Del, who is a teacher and designer by profession, but she has given journalism and me enormous support over many years and kept me going through difficult times,” he said.

“There’s a whole range of people who have contributed over the years so it’s sort of like a recognition of all of us. So, yes, it is a delight and I feel quite privileged,” he said.

Starting his career at The Dominion in 1965, Dr Robie has been “on the ground” at pivotal events in regional history, including the bombing of the Rainbow Warrior in 1985 (he was on board the Greenpeace ship on the voyage to the Marshall Islands and wrote the book Eyes of Fire about it), the 1997 Sandline mercenary scandal in Papua New Guinea, and the George Speight coup in Fiji in 2000.

In both PNG and Fiji, Dr Robie and his journalism students covered unfolding events when their safety was far from assured.

As an educator, Dr Robie was head of journalism at the University of Papua New Guinea (UPNG) 1993-1997 and then at the University of the South Pacific (USP) in Suva from 1998 to 2002.

Started Pacific Media Centre
In 2007 he started the Pacific Media Centre, while working as professor of Pacific journalism and communications at Auckland University of Technology (AUT). He has organised scholarships for Pacific media students, including scholarships to China, Indonesia and the Philippines, with the Asia New Zealand Foundation.

Running education programmes for journalists was not always easy. While he had a solid programme to follow at UPNG, his start at USP was not as easy.

He described arriving at USP, opening the filing cabinet to discover “…there was nothing there.” It was a “baptism of fire” and he had to rebuild the programme, although he notes that currently UPNG is struggling whereas USP is “bounding ahead.”

He wrote about his experiences in the 2004 book Mekim Nius: South Pacific media, politics and education.

Dr Robie recalled the enthusiasm of his Pacific journalism students in the face of significant challenges. Pacific journalists are regularly confronted by threats and pressures from governments, which do not recognise the importance of a free media to a functioning democracy.

He stated that while resources were being employed to train quality regional journalists, it was really politicians who needed educating about the role of the media, particularly public broadcasters — not just to be a “parrot” for government policy.

Another challenge Robie noted was the attrition of quality journalists, who only stay in the mainstream media for a year or two before finding better-paying communication roles in NGOs.

Independence an issue
He said that while resourcing was an issue the other most significant challenge facing media outlets in the Pacific today was independence — freedom from the influence and control of the power players in the region.

While he mentioned China, he also suggested that the West also attempted to expand its own influence, and that Pacific media should be able set its own path.

“The other big challenge facing the Pacific is the climate crisis and consequently that’s the biggest issue for journalists in the region and they deal with this every day, unlike Australia and New Zealand,” he said.

Dr Robie stated his belief that it was love of the industry that had kept him and other journalists going, that being a journalist was an important role and a service to society, more than just a job.

He expressed deep gratitude for having been given the opportunity to serve the Pacific in this capacity for so long.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

The King’s Birthday Honours list:

To be Officers of the New Zealand Order of Merit:

• The Very Reverend Taimoanaifakaofo Kaio for services to the Pacific community
• Anapela Polataivao for services to Pacific performing arts

To be a Member of the New Zealand Order of Merit:

• Bridget Kauraka for services to the Cook Islands community
• Frances Oakes for services to mental health and the Pacific community
• Leitualaalemalietoa Lynn Lolokini Pavihi for services to Pacific education
• Dr David Robie for services to journalism and Asia-Pacific media education

The King’s Service Medal (KSM):

• Mailigi Hetutū for services to the Niuean community
• Tupuna Kaiaruna for services to the Cook Islands community and performing arts
• Maituteau Karora for services to the Cook Islands community

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Facilitated by ABC International Development, and conducted by veteran journalist Scott Waide, the first-of-its-kind training in Papua New Guinea aims to plug the skills gaps identified in the last 10 years, especially with news journalists.

“While we have students graduating from the University of Technology, Divine Word, the Pacific Adventist University and the University of Papua New Guinea, training gaps still remain,” Waide told Lae media after the second day of the weeklong training on Tuesday.

“And some of those gaps are very basic and shouldn’t be that way.

“With the help of ABC, this template was developed and we had to go through the training ourselves.

“A trainer, Chris Kimball, tested it on us and we suggested changes — for local context — and then we took the training and tested it on Chris and all our participants to see if it worked.”

The training includes the definition of public interest journalism, what constitutes public interest, interviewing tips and tools, writing structures, characteristics of a good journalist and the difference between proactive and reactive journalism.

“It seems very basic but if you look at it, the content is very relevant,” said Waide.

“If a person is graduating from another course, another programme in university, and then goes into news journalism; we’ll take him or her through that course and give that person a broad understanding of what news is and what journalism is.

“Particularly in Papua New Guinea, it’s about public interest journalism.

“We can talk about the big things, like politics and economics, but if there’s no understanding of why we’re doing it and why people are important in public interest journalism then that journalism actually becomes useless and worthless.”

Seven Highlands-based NBC presenters and broadcasters are also part of the training, including members of Lae media.

The training ended yesterday.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The Journalism Education and Research Association of Australia (JERAA) has joined media freedom groups supporting Julian Assange, an Australian citizen whose unjust prosecution continues to undermine press freedoms and human rights.

In light of recent developments and mounting concerns over Assange’s deteriorating health, JERAA said in a statement it had urged the United States to drop all charges against Assange and facilitate his immediate return to Australia.

Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, has been the subject of relentless persecution by the US government for his efforts to expose war crimes and government misconduct.

Assange received a Walkley Award in 2011 for outstanding contribution to journalism through Wikileaks, which included the release of the 2010 “collateral murder” video and the publication of classified US diplomatic cables, shedding light on atrocities committed by the US in Iraq and Afghanistan.

“It is concerning that Assange faces up to 175 years in jail if found guilty of espionage charges — a sentence that would effectively silence whistle-blowers and journalists worldwide,” JERAA said.

The association said it believed that Assange’s indictment set a dangerous precedent and posed a grave threat to the fundamental principles of press freedom and freedom of expression.

‘Enough is enough’
JERAA commended Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for his support in calling for Assange’s release and said it echoed his sentiment that “enough is enough.”

PM Albanese’s recent vote in the federal Parliament for a motion demanding Assange’s return to Australia underscores the legitimacy of our demand. The motion, which received overwhelming support, leaves no room for ambiguity — it is time to bring Assange home.

The WikiLeaks 2010 “collateral damage” video.         Video: Al Jazeera

As the UK High Court prepares to rule on Assange’s appeal against extradition in a two-day hearing next week (February 20-21), and with Prime Minister Albanese’s continued efforts to advocate for Assange’s release, JERAA has urged the US to heed the calls for justice and drop all charges against Assange.

It is imperative that Assange’s rights as an Australian citizen be respected, and that he be afforded the opportunity to return home.

JERAA president Associate Professor Alexandra Wake said that while some members might not agree with all Assange has done in his life, it was clear that his work was central to our “understanding of press freedoms and human rights”.

“JERAA upholds the principles of a free and independent press. It is time to end the trial of global media freedom,” she said.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The University of Fiji will be offering its journalism and media studies programme at its Samabula campus from this semester.

UniFiji vice-chancellor Professor Shaista Shameem said the programme started at the Saweni campus in Lautoka in 2022 with only five students and had been growing since then.

She said there would now be more students registering for the programme as it was positioned closer to the court and Parliament for better news coverage.

Professor Shameem said the programme was drafted and written with the help of senior journalists and news media people in Fiji including Communications Fiji Limited chairman William Parkinson, Sitiveni Halofaki from Fiji TV, former Fiji Sun managing editor Nemani Delaibatiki, Matai Akauola, Anish Chand from The Fiji Times and Stanley Simpson of Mai TV.

The vice-chancellor said the programme was different from the other universities and student journalists were sent for training in newsrooms during their first year of study so that they could become well known with their bylines.

She said the university also has a newspaper, known as UniFiji Watch, and a radio station, Vox Populi, which had won an international award for college radio.

Industry teachers
The vice-chancellor said that most of the courses were taught by people in the journalism industry and veteran journalists, including Communications Fiji Limited news director Vijay Narayan, Vimal Madhavan and Matai Akoula.

She said the university also wanted to add film and a documentary course to the programme.

Head of department Dr Kamala Naiker said journalism students needed opportunities for innovation. The first lot of student journalists would be graduating next year.

Republished with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The University of the South Pacific journalism programme is hosting a cohort student journalists from Australia’s Queensland University of Technology this week.

Led by Professor Angela Romano, the 12 students are covering news assignments in Fiji as part of their working trip.

The visitors were given a briefing by USP journalism teaching staff — Associate Professor in Pacific journalism and programme head Dr Shailendra Singh, and student training newspaper supervising editor-in-chief Monika Singh.

The students held lively discussions about the form and state of the media in Fiji and the Pacific, the historic influence of Australian and Western news media and its pros and cons, and the impact of the emergence of China on the Pacific media scene.

Dr Singh said the small and micro-Pacific media systems were “still reeling” from revenue loss due to digital disruption and the covid-19 pandemic.

As elsewhere in the world, the “rivers of gold” (classified advertising revenue) had virtually dried up and media in the Pacific were apparently struggling like never before.

Dr Singh said that this was evident from the reduced size of some newspapers in the Pacific, in both classified and display advertising, which had migrated to social media platforms.

Repeal of draconian law
He praised Fiji’s coalition government for repealing the country’s draconian Media Industry Development Act last year, and reviving media self-regulation under the revamped Fiji Media Council.

However, Dr Singh added that there was still some way to go to further improve the media landscape, including focus on training and development and working conditions.

“There are major, longstanding challenges in small and micro-Pacific media systems due to small audiences, and marginal profits,” he said. “This makes capital investment and staff development difficult to achieve.”

The QUT students are in Suva this month on a working trip in which students will engage in meetings, interviews and production of journalism. They will meet non-government organisations that have a strong focus on women/gender in development, democracy or peace work.

The students will also visit different media organisations based in Suva and talk to their female journalists on their experiences and their stories.

The USP journalism programme started in Suva in 1988 and it has produced more than 200 graduates serving the Pacific and beyond in various media and communication roles.

The programme has forged partnerships with leading media players in the Pacific and our graduates are shining examples in the fields of journalism, public relations and government/NGO communication.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Jock Cheetham, senior lecturer in news and media in the Charles Sturt School of Information and Communication Studies in Bathurst, said recent “news” of the demise of the journalism course was greatly exaggerated.

Cheetham said he was surprised to wake up and read a media report in late July suggesting journalism was not being taught separately at Charles Sturt University.

“That day I spent six hours teaching news and media, also known as ‘journalism’,” he said.

“Actually, on that Tuesday we had ABC veteran Trevor Watson visit us on campus to give a guest talk on journalism, specifically news writing, which was also streamed to online students.

“Before that talk, I spent two hours with a class analysing media coverage of The Voice to Parliament Referendum campaigns. After Trevor’s talk, I held a news writing tutorial doing practice exercises on the hard news style of reporting.”

‘Pretty journalistic day’
He said it was a “pretty journalistic” day.

“We’re still teaching journalism, with practical opportunities to work in newsrooms, such as National Radio News,” he said.

Cheetham emphasised that quality journalism had never been more important, and Charles Sturt had an enviable reputation for producing some of the world’s best, most-renowned journalists.

As the original ABC article noted, over the past five decades, the university has nurtured some of the nation’s most high-profile communicators, including Andrew Denton, Melissa Doyle, Samantha Armytage, Hamish Macdonald, Chris Bath, and current ABC News Europe correspondent Nick Dole.

“Charles Sturt University will continue to educate and train journalists for the evolving media landscape,” Cheetham said.

“At the University campus in Bathurst we continue to have cutting-edge facilities, such as a TV studio, a community broadcasting radio station, and editing suites, for our students to gain skills and insights into working in their chosen fields.

“We’re also investing substantial funds in the communications hub that will provide new facilities for our future students.”

For example, graduates from 2021 include 7News (Central West) journalist Reuben Spargo who won the 2021 JERAA Ossie Award for ‘national student journalist of the year’.

“Charles Sturt threw practical skills at me and helped grow my confidence as a communicator,” Spargo said.

“The connections I made and the experiences I shared allowed me to hit the ground running within the industry.”

Keeping pace
Cheetham said to keep pace with the ever-changing media industry and digital advancements, Charles Sturt had launched a new communication course with its first intake last year, 2022.

“The new Bachelor of Communication offers specialisations in strategic communication, news and media — journalism, which I teach — and design and content creation,” he said.

“Teaching the critical role of journalism is still very much a priority at Charles Sturt. The changes represent a transition from one version of the journalism degree, which we have offered for more than 50 years, into a new degree program.

“The philosophy behind the new course remains the same — we’re aiming to produce people who are good storytellers. We have retained a lot of the strongest elements of the old course bringing them into the new course.”

Having industry and alumni co-design the course with academic staff offers students a unique combination of academic, discipline-specific specialisations with a sound understanding of the industry through the networking and industry connections embedded within the course.

The format of the new degree combines first-hand industry knowledge and advice, and to have industry professionals sharing knowledge, expertise and daily experiences will be a real game changer for the students.

Republished from CSU News with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The University of the South Pacific’s regional journalism programme has penned three milestone Memorandums of Understanding that will usher in greater collaboration with media industry partners over student upskilling and training, joint workshops and seminars, and publication of the award-winning training newspaper Wansolwara.

Papua New Guinea’s National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) and the Pacific Islands News Association (PINA) have formalised three-year MOU partnerships with the region’s longest running journalism programme at Laucala campus.

They were signed by NBC managing director Kora Nou and PINA managing editor Makereta Komai respectively.

The signing ceremony was witnessed by PNG’s Minister for Communication and Information Technology Timothy Masiu — a former journalist — and USP’s deputy vice-chancellor (regional campuses and global engagement) Dr Giulio Paunga.

“It is indeed history because we have never had such an MOU between this prestigious university and our National Broadcasting Corporation, which is a flagship of PNG,” said  Masiu.

“The intention of this MOU is basically threefold — student training, staff exchanges and joint workshops, seminars, research activities. We are really looking forward to this; very interesting times ahead for NBC and your university.”

To further strengthen the MOU, Masiu announced a F$10,000 funding support for the journalism programme through the PINA office. NBC’s managing director is also current chair of PINA.

Masiu as a journalist
Masiu also shared his excitement and delight at being part of the signing ceremony and reminisced about his time as a broadcaster for NBC, and later a journalist for The National daily newspaper in Port Moresby.

Dr Paunga said the university was also currently working closely with the PNG government and the progress of this collaboration demonstrated great things to come between the two countries, its people and future students.

USP Journalism programme coordinator Associate Professor Shailendra Singh said the programme was doing some good work in journalism in Fiji and the region. He commended Komai and Nou for their cooperation and vision over the MOU.

“The MOU we have signed is going to take the training and development of our journalists to another level,” he said.

“We have been training journalists for a long time. Under this MOU, we will be able to decide our own agenda when it comes to training and research, instead of everything being designed from someplace else and us merely implementing it.

“We know PNG will be sending students to study at USP. Talks are underway and if that happens then there will be greater collaboration and interaction between students coming from PNG.”

Dr Singh said USP had 12-member countries and PNG was set to become the 13th member if talks went according to plan.

Fiji Times partnership

Earlier, on May 3 — World Press Freedom Day — USP Journalism signed the first MOU with Fiji Times Limited. The partnership includes, among other supportive initiatives, the publication of Wansolwara, twice a year.

The first Wansolwara edition for 2023 was published in The Sunday Times last week and featured 32 pages of news, sports and special reports written and produced by USP journalism students across Fiji and the region.

Dr Singh said the partnership with Fiji Times Ltd was also a boost for the programme.

“This is a historic moment, not just for us but also for our students, as this will give them the exposure they need to contribute and improve the standard of journalism in our region,” he said.

“Fiji Times Ltd has been supportive of the USP Journalism Programme for many years, and this partnership will strengthen their commitment to promote a free and fair environment for journalists.”

Fiji Times Pte Ltd general manager Christine Lyons said the company would cover the printing of Wansolwara twice in the academic year. This amounted to one publication per semester.

“It will be circulated as an insert in The Fiji Times as part of its corporate social responsibility,” she said.

Fiji Times Ltd was represented by editor-in-chief Fred Wesley at the May MOU signing.

Viliame Tawanakoro is a final-year student journalist at USP’s Laucala Campus. He is also the 2023 student editor for Wansolwara, USP Journalism’s student training newspaper and online publication. Republished in a partnership between Asia Pacific Report and Wansolwara.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

I wasn’t good at French in my final year of high school. My classmates had five years of language studies behind them. I had three. As a result of my woeful grip on the language, I wrote a terribly bad essay in my final French exam.

The more I read of ChatGPT’s output, the more I am reminded of my final French essay. I could not express the complex ideas I wrote in my English essays, so instead, I repeated the question a lot and clumped together words and phrases that sounded like they kind of went together. There was no logical thread, no cogent argument.

It was a bit like the perplexing, digressive, buzzword-rich oratory stylings of Donald Trump.

I have been a university lecturer, tutor and marker for coming on two decades now and late last year a student submitted an essay that I sent off to the university integrity team, explaining that it was “bad in a new and different way”.

According to Turnitin (our detection software), it wasn’t plagiarised. It didn’t read like it had been written in another language and run through Google Translate. The grammar was impeccable but there were glaring non-sequiturs and it danced around the question, which it repeated several times, but didn’t actually answer.

I didn’t hear back from the integrity people. They probably didn’t know what to do about it and may have been busy, as it was the end of the teaching year. I had also said it wasn’t urgent, as it had failed against my marking key, meaning the student, whose marks had been poor all along, would have to repeat the unit anyway.

New teaching year
A couple of weeks later ChatGPT was made available to the public, joining the dozen or so other AI writers available to people who want AI to string together their sentences.

Now, heading back into a new teaching year, having spent the summer chatting with ChatGPT, I am in conversations with my colleagues about how we should proceed. I teach journalism and my colleagues are from a range of arts and communications disciplines.

Collectively our feelings are mixed, but I’m looking forward to letting my students know about this leap forward in communications technology.

I plan to explain it in the context of the other leaps and lurches I’ve lived through.

This won’t be the first to make swathes of workers redundant. I remember the angst in my industry about digital typesetting usurping the compositors and typesetters, replacing vast numbers of them with far fewer graphic designers.

ChatGPT will undoubtedly take some jobs, but it’s the donkey work of the writing professions. It frees us up to do the innovative fun stuff. Also, while ChatGPT is big and shiny, we’ve known that AI writing is on its way for a long time.

In 2018, Noam Lemelshtrich Latar summed up the progress in our field to date in his book Robot Journalism: Can human journalism survive? He documented the many workplaces already using AI writing software and concluded that there was still work to be done. There still is.

Essay capacity underwhelming
Much of the media racket over ChatGPT this summer has been about its capacity to write essays, and so I have read several essays it has written, and I can happily report that I am underwhelmed by them, but also fascinated by the challenge we face in getting better at describing the ways in which they are bad.

This task is part of the mission humanity more broadly is facing in figuring out what it is that people can do that robots can’t. If robots/AI writers are going to do the donkey-work writing in workplaces, that is not something we need to be training graduates to do.

Graduates need to be able to do things an AI language model can’t, and they need to be able to articulate their skill sets.

So, I will be generating AI content in my classrooms and we are going to set to work pulling it apart, in search of its failings and foibles. We’ll do this together and learn about it and ourselves as we go.

Another big theme in the media hype has been ChatGPT’s ability to “do the marking for us”. This, in my opinion, is rubbish. Sure, you can copy-and-paste some text into ChatGPT and ask it for a comment and a grade, but every university I know of demands more of the markers than a simple comment and grade.

If only it was that simple. But, no. We have to describe the specific criteria every piece of work will be assessed against, and the expectations ascribed to each criterion that will result in the award of a specific number of marks. This forms a table called a rubric, which is embedded in our unit websites and getting the assignments and rubrics out of that software and into ChatGPT would take longer than the tight time allocation we get to mark each piece.

Besides the software we mark in is already replete with time-saving tricks, like a record function so you can speak rather than type feedback and the ability to save commonly used comments.

‘Getting to know students’
In addition, failing to read the assignments would inhibit the “getting to know your students” process that marking their work facilitates, and so I imagine it to be the sort of drain-circling behaviour used by failing teachers on their way out of the profession — as student assessment of teachers who cheat in their marking is going to be on par with teacher assessment of students who cheat in their assessments.

Cheating is a key word here. While ChatGPT is new, universities have longstanding policies and charters that use words like “honesty and fairness” in relation to academic integrity. These are being underscored and highlighted in preparation for the start of semester and hyperlinked to paragraphs about AI writing.

Honest use of ChatGPT will involve disclosure about how it was used, and what measures have been taken to verify its content and iron out its wrinkles. It then joins the swath of online tools we encourage our students to use to prepare them for the professions they’ll enter when they graduate.

For my first year students these will be professions that have adjusted to the existence of AI language models, and so their new graduate brilliance will need to be focused on things only humans can do to make the world a better place. This is how I’m going to frame it in my classes, when our next semester starts.

Dr Kayt Davies is a lecturer in journalism at Curtin University. She is a contributor to Pacific Journalism Review. The article was first published in The West Australian and is republished by Asia Pacific Report with the author’s permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

President Édouard Fritch of French Polynesia says he wants to boost funds to study journalism in French Polynesia in a bid to help strengthen the media industry quality, reports RNZ Pacific.

According to the local Ministry of Education, the amount given for study grants will vary from US$536 to US$1341 per month, depending on the level of study.

Fritch told La Première television about the “growing threat of false information” and the importance of reliable news outlets.

“Those social media pages escape the realm of news outlets, they shy away from all verification and create confusion and worse, they act as the public’s spokesperson,” he said.

“That is why I think it is a must that the journalism sector must be supported by the country.”

Meanwhile, public broadcaster France Télévision — La Première — reports that its audience in French overseas territories grew in 2022 and now reaches 42 percent of the 889,000 audience at least once.

La Première in Tahiti heads the audience share with 36.5 percent. Figures for other territories are: French Guyana 33.4 percent, Mayotte 31.4 percent, New Caledonia 30.2 percent, Gaudeloupe 27.1 percent, Martinique 18.1 percent, and Réunion 14.5 percent.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. 

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Journalism students from Australia’s Macleay College programme with 50 participants are saying their degrees have been cancelled just two weeks into the course.

Macleay is a private tertiary institution with campuses in Sydney and Melbourne. Macleay students say that on Friday afternoon they were sent an email saying their Bachelor of Journalism degree course would be cancelled due to low enrolment numbers.

The email states that first-year students can either switch to a digital media course or withdraw and receive a statement of attainment for their completed units.

Macleay College also requests that the students inform it of their decision by the census date on March 18.

This would leave the students with an extremely short time to make such an important decision.

Since the unexpected email on Friday afternoon, the university has not provided any further support to students, student Ezra Bell told Pedestrian.TV.

“There’s been no communication from the uni they’ve really just hung us out to dry,” she said.

“Why couldn’t they have said this to our faces?”

Bell doubted that enrolment numbers — about 48 are on the programme — were the reason for the shutdown.

“What’s the real reason because we all know low enrolments is not the case.”

This point was echoed by another Macleay journalism student, Kelsey Richmond. Richmond claimed that student enrolment numbers had actually increased.

Macleay students have taken to Twitter to vent about the experience.

The Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance (MEAA) confirmed on Saturday that the degree had been cancelled. The union estimated about 48 students would be impacted.

Student Chelsea Caffery claimed the college told students to reach out to psychologists if they need it. But the university’s mental health services do not re-open until Monday.

Chelsea further alleged that staff were not aware that the degree was going to be cancelled.

“To be told on a Friday afternoon after hours is really heartless,” Chelsea told news.com.

“The head of Journalism [Sue Stephenson] only found out minutes before the students did… after 5pm… on a Friday.”

After spending the day at @MacleayCollege just found out that my journalism degree has been canned two weeks in due to “low enrolments”. Absolutely devastated. 1/2

— Ezra Bell (@ezrabell_) March 11, 2022

The college has not released a statement about the situation yet, but it is already copping flack online.

Macleay College advised the dumped journo students to reach out to the psychologist if needed. Funny that. The psychologist isn’t open until Monday morning, and we were informed of the cancellation Friday afternoon. So I guess mental health can just wait til Monday, right?

— Chelsea Caffery (@ChelseaCaffery) March 11, 2022

As pointed out by Journalism Education and Research Association of Australia (JERAA) president Dr Alexandra Wake, most universities have now closed their enrolments.

It’s a very difficult time for this decision to have been made with first semester enrolments now closed at most universities – and it’s a long weekend in Victoria. Not sure what offer other unis can make but am looking into it.

— Alexandra Wake, PhD (@WakeinFright) March 11, 2022

This means it could be really hard for those students to re-enrol in other degrees.

On top of everything else, Macleay college’s degree in journalism is not cheap.

It costs $54,000 to complete all 24 units so the potential financial burden on students is high.

The private university is owned by fashion entrepreneur Sarah Stavrow. She told news.com that she would not be commenting.

Asia Pacific Report adds: A statement by the Australian Tertiary Education Quality and Standards Agency (TEQSA) said it was seeking further information about Maclean’s decision and support that was being offered to affected students to complete their studies.

“The timing and manner of how this was communicated by Macleay College to their students is also of concern to TEQSA,” said the statement.

It added that if there had been a breach of the Higher Education Standards Framework, “appropriate enforcement action” would be taken to protect the students’ interests.

Kathleen Farmilo and Sweeney Preston are writers for Pedestrian.TV.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz